


Tumblr Johnlock Ficlet Collection

by sussexbound (SamanthaLenore)



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Anniversary, Canon Divergence, Drug Use, Fake/Pretend Relationship, First Kiss, First Time, HLV fix-it, Love Confessions, M/M, Sexual Harassment, Sharing a Bed, sexual negotiation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-31
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-11 18:05:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 17,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13529700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SamanthaLenore/pseuds/sussexbound
Summary: This is a place to gather all the johnlock ficlets I post on tumblr.  These are stories too short to post on their own.  Tags will be updated with each ficlet posted.  Author notes will call out any additional warnings.





	1. Happy Anniversary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was written for the anniversary of John and Sherlock's first meeting.
> 
>  **Tags:** #love confessions, #first kiss

“Shh…”

John snaps his attention away from the muddy-green, linoleum tile of the lab, and up to Sherlock’s face.  It’s neutral.  He’s focussed on whatever is beneath the microscope he’s fiddling with.

“I’ve not said anything.”

“You were thinking—very loudly.”

“Well, I can’t help it if you can hear my thoughts, now, can I.”

Sherlock’s mouth twitches momentarily.  “Point taken.”  He replaces the slide with another, adjusts the course, and then the fine focus.  “What were you thinking about?”

There was a time John would have been taken aback by such candour, but Sherlock is different these days, has been for awhile really, and there’s something about the open, honest, but slightly tentative way he asks that makes John more amenable than usual to share.

“Today is the anniversary of the day we met.”

Sherlock’s eyes flick up to meet his for a moment and then return to the task at hand.  “Is it?”

“Yeah.  Seven years ago, today.”

“Mmm.”

“Was thinking about how we met in a lab, how we almost ended in a morgue.  We always seem to do the big things in the bowels of a hospital.”

“Appropriate, I suppose.”

“Appropriate?”

“Beginnings and endings almost always happen in hospitals.”

“Mm, true…  Bit like a cosmic bus stop, I guess.”

Sherlock chuckles and switches out the slide in the microscope once again.

John balls up his fist, and stares back down at the chipped and ageing floor.  He chews at the inside of his cheek.  It’s a perfect opportunity.  Probably not now or never, but he’s getting awful, bloody tired of now or later.  “Happy Anniversary.”

When he looks back up again, Sherlock has gone very still.  It takes him a moment to collect himself enough to look up and reply, which John can’t help but think might be promising.

“And to you,” Sherlock finally manages.  He swallows dryly, his eyes flitting back down to the microscope.  He fiddles with the dials, but he’s not looking into it.  “John—I hope you’re not expecting some sentimental display.  Anniversaries, are just days, they mean very little in the scheme of things, and I have absolutely no intention of…”

He’s rambling.  It’s panic, John suddenly realises.  It’s sheer panic, and Sherlock is unwittingly showing every single one of his cards.  It’s all the confirmation John needs.

He reaches Sherlock in four steps, takes his face in his hands, and kisses him.

Sherlock’s whole body goes rigid for the briefest of seconds, and then he lets go, goes liquid, reaches out for John’s body for support, and kisses him back with a clumsy desperation that makes John giddy with joy and relief.  He smiles against Sherlock’s mouth, and Sherlock pulls back, brow knit, cheeks pink.

John laughs.  “Sorry about the sentimental display.  What would you say to dinner at Angelo’s in a couple of hours?  Too much?”

Sherlock blinks down at him.  He still looks a little stunned.  “Dinner?  Oh.  Dinner.  Yes, fine.  Good.”

John grins.  “Well—good.”

Sherlock is still standing close, hands resting on John’s hips, but he is looking everywhere but at John.  “Do you think,” he finally manages.  “Do you think that…  It’s just that I wouldn’t be averse, to…”

“You want me to kiss you again?”

Sherlock’s eyes come home to John’s then, dip down to his mouth and back up.  “Yes.”

John reaches out and pulls Sherlock a little closer, relishes in the firm warmth of his body, the way Sherlock’s hands lift from his hips to splay, large and hot against his back.  “Can’t say I mind that.  You want to get out of here, though?  Go back to the flat for awhile before supper?  I’ve got the minder at mine until 20:00.”

Sherlock just nods, wide-eyed.  Totally speechless.

John kisses him once more before they pack up and leave.  Just for good measure.  Just because.

It turns out to be the best anniversary John’s ever had.


	2. A Happy Accident

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Tags:** #love confessions, #morning after, #first time, #fake relationship, #that turns real, #first kiss,

John wakes to the smell of sandalwood, vanilla and roses, to the sour taste of champagne on his lips, the slip of satin sheets beneath his naked body, and to the sensation of warm breath wafting gently against his neck.  

It takes a moment or two to work out the where, the how and the who.

Niagara Falls, Canada.  A honeymoon suite. Horrible place.  Heart-shaped hot tub in one corner, rose petals on the matching bed, and cheap champagne in a bucket on the the gilded nightstand.  All of which had gotten good use the night before.  

Some New Age couples retreat.  Cover for a case, of course, but still—it had been quite the week of trust building, intimacy encounters and group sex therapy.  John shudders at the memory of that, and stretches a little, wiggling his toes as he presses back, experimentally against the warm body spooned behind him.  

Sherlock huffs into John’s hair, and mumbles something nonsensical, and John smiles even as his stomach knots with anxiety.  Last night happened.  It happened.  He has no idea how it happened, he’s glad it happened, but he doesn’t know if Sherlock will feel the same way now, come light of day.

“Maître d'hôtel did it…”  Murmured against John’s neck.

John grins.  He rolls over and watches as Sherlock’s eyes move beneath his closed lids.  His hair is a riot, his cheeks flushed and warm with sleep, mouth lax like a wilted bow.  “That right?  I thought for sure it was that Sanders woman.”

“Mmm…”  The only response he gets.

John smiles again.  He can’t help himself.  He wants Sherlock to open his eyes.  He needs to know that whatever last night was, it was wanted, desired—cherished.

But then again…

It might’ve been a mistake.

It might ruin everything they’ve so carefully reconstructed in the last year.

They shouldn’t have had the champagne.  John had been too giddy already.  The nightly, group therapy sessions had been the worst part of the week.  It had taken every ounce of his control to stay in character and keep himself from bursting into a fit of giggles mid-session, as Sherlock affectedly and effectively talked to the sympathetic group about how he and John had been drifting apart since their marriage in Aruba five years prior, how the spark was gone, how the bonds of trust had started to fray and their former intimacy to evaporate.  

He’d managed to hold it together, but just, and that is why, when they finally got back to the room, he had really let loose.  Sherlock had been uncharacteristically quiet and pouty about it at first, but John soon had him joining in.  It hadn’t been long before the laughter had then turned into fond, sarcastic banter, a mocking play-by-play of the entire weeks’ sessions fuelled by the afore mentioned champagne, followed inexplicably by a bit of playful jostling, which had swiftly devolved to horseplay, and then to—well, to something else entirely.

John shivers at the still fresh memory of Sherlock’s hand accidentally sliding over the curve of his arse, of his tongue sliding against John’s, tantalisingly slow, exploratory.  He thinks he can still feel the taste of Sherlock’s moans in his mouth.

He shuts his eyes and breathes deep, wills himself not to dwell on it.

Sherlock’s nose wrinkles, and he makes a contented hum at the back of his throat, stirring, frowning, stilling.  His eyes finally pop open.  He blinks, disoriented for moment, before his eyes focus.  “John?”

“Hi.”

Sherlock’s lips part.  

“Breathe maybe,” John reminds him.

And Sherlock lets his held breath out in a huff.  “You’re still here…”  He sounds sincerely surprised, and it pains John somewhere deep down.  It’s not as though it’s undeserved.  Sherlock has plenty of reason to assume John would shag him and leave him, but even so—it still hurts.

“‘Course I am.  Wouldn’t make you wake up alone.”  If he sounds slightly defensive, it can’t be helped.

Sherlock blinks some more, stares down at the red, satin pillowcase between them.  It’s awkward.  John didn’t want it to be awkward.  The night before, accidental though it may have been, was one of the most memorable of his life.  It had meant something.  It had meant everything.

“Can you look at me?”  John still sounds angry, he realises.  He hates it, tries hard to school his tone for what he wants to say next.  “Just—look at me, okay.”

Sherlock does.  He looks small, and vulnerable for the briefest of moments, before his masks start to slide back into place, and isn’t that just the very last thing John wants to see happen.

“John, obviously there is no obligation.  If this was all a mis…”

John kisses him before he can finish.  It’s not heated, but it’s not exactly chaste either.  It’s the sort of kiss where intentions can’t be mistaken.  It’s a question and an answer all at once.

To John’s great relief Sherlock kisses back with a gasp and a sigh exhaled slowly through his nose, as he opens to John, let’s him deepen the kiss.  The relief washes over Sherlock’s body like a wave, all the tension of a moment before disappearing as John slides closer, twines their naked limbs.  

They are both still warm, and heavy with sleep, Sherlock already half hard, and John not far behind him.  Like the night before, Sherlock is eager, and determined now that he knows his touch is wanted.  His hands slide down John’s ribs, his arms scoop beneath his waist, pull him close.  John moans without thinking, and feels Sherlock grin against his mouth.

John pulls back.  “Wait.  I wanted to talk to you.”

“Was whatever you were going to say better than what we’re currently doing?”

John smiles.  “Not sure.  I guess that’s up to you to decide.”

Sherlock’s face goes solemn, but the firmness of his embrace never falters.  “Alright.  What did you want to say?”

Suddenly, John is anxious.  Sherlock must sense it, because he pulls him closer, presses his lips to John’s forehead, before looking down again, pressing their foreheads together.  “What did you want to say?”  Deep and sure, encouragement breathed over John’s lips.

“That last night…  It meant something.  It wasn’t a mistake.  Not to me.  It’s something I’ve been thinking about, wanting, for a long time.  Didn’t really expect it to happen like this, in some place like this…”  John’s eyes wander, take in their tacky surroundings.  

Sherlock chuckles and pulls him closer still.  “Well, one can’t have everything, I suppose…”

“But I do.”

A small wrinkle forms at the bridge of Sherlock’s nose.  John fights the urge to kiss it away.  “I do have everything.  This.  You.  Us.  That is everything, all I’ve ever wanted, and I’m bloody furious at myself for taking this long, and having it all happen like this, but it did happen.  Last night happened, and I have no regrets.”

Sherlock’s eyes look suspiciously red-rimmed.  John smiles.  “I love you, you know.”

The tears that had been threatening spill over as Sherlock huffs a small, incredulous smile.  “Do you?”

“Yeah…  Yeah, I do.”

Sherlock tilts his head to one side and buries his face in John’s neck.  “I do too.”

“What?  Love yourself?  Well, we all know that.”  John breathes into Sherlock’s curls with a chuckle.

“No!”  Sherlock pulls back to look up at him, face pale and mouth set.  “I love you— _you,_  John.”

“Was just teasing you.”

Sherlock just looks confused.  

“It’s—it’s nothing.  You love me?  Really?”

“Of course, John.  Why would I have said so, if I didn’t?”

“Dunno.”

Sherlock buries his face back in John’s neck, his lips pressing behind John’s ear, travelling down to the cup of his throat.  John lets his eyes slide shut, cards his fingers through Sherlock’s curls and holds on tight as he tries to remember how to breathe.  

“Now…”  Sherlock drops another kiss on John’s clavicle.  “Can we get back to what we were doing before?”

John laughs, high, and breathy, and filled with joy.  “Yeah.  God yes.  Please.”  


	3. New Beginnings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Saw [this post](http://lifeonthesideoftheangels.tumblr.com/post/170347438737/one-day-irene-is-going-to-text-and-john-is-going), and might have gotten a wee bit inspired…

John’s whole body goes tense at the sound.  He sets the mug of tea he’s holding back on the counter, and pops his head around the door to the lounge.  “What’s that?”

“Mm?”

“That.  That alert noise.”

Sherlock doesn’t even look up from his phone.  He just stares at the screen, an unreadable statue.

“Did you hear me?”

“Yes.”

“Well…?”

“It’s an alert tone, as you assumed.  I don’t know what you’re asking.”

“It’s not one you usually use.”

“I’m not allowed to change alert tones?”

John sniffs, and balls his fists hard in an attempt to quell the surge of tight, hot anger that seems to surge through every cell.  “It’s her.” 

Sherlock tries to school his features into his most innocent of looks, but the sheepishness is woefully transparent.

“Yeah, you know what…”  And before he has time to think about what he’s doing, John has strode forward and plucked the phone from Sherlock’s hand.

Sherlock’s eyes go wide, and his mouth pops open in a look that seems more fear than irritation.

“For fucks sake, if you don’t text her back I will.  If she’s nothing, it’s nothing, then you won’t mind me and her having a little chat, yeah?”  Sherlock’s mouth parts even wider, as though he wants to say something, but there are no words forthcoming.  

John cocks a brow in anticipation, and then shakes his head when Sherlock continues to sit mute.  He looks down at the screen in his hand:

_John loves you too, you know.  Just tell him already!_

The world goes oddly still and silent.  He can hear the afternoon traffic racing by outside, the tick of the clock in the kitchen, Mrs. Hudson’s radio playing a floor below, but in this room, between them--utter stillness.  They have both forgotten how to breathe.

John finally sucks in a sharp breath as his head starts to go light.  He looks up.  Sherlock is pale, mouth opening and closing like he’s desperate to say something, anything, but…

“I’m sorry,” he finally manages, shoots up from his chair and disappears into his bedroom, closing the door behind him with a soft click.

John’s legs feel like jelly.  He slides down into Sherlock’s chair, comforted, somehow, by the warmth left behind by his body, and stares down at the screen in front of him.  He shouldn’t, he knows, but he scrolls up in the conversation for context.  

There are only a few lines exchanged every few months.  They usually start off light, bantering, but then quickly return to what seems to be the only topic they truly talk about—John.  More specifically, Sherlock’s unrequited feelings for John.

Something clenches tight in his chest.  He feels like he’s drowning.  His eyes bite and burn.  The texts go back months, well over a year, and that is when Sherlock had gotten a new phone, so it’s possible they’d chatted for longer than that.  Months and months of words, and always his name is there, in the middles of it all: john, John,  _JOHN_.

John stands up, goes to the kitchen, stares down the hall to the closed door at the end.  His body says  _go_ , but what would he even say?  What would happen once he got there?  The whole situation is awkward, and awful, and it is no one’s fault but his.  

He needs...  He needs time, air.  He needs to think.

Returning to the lounge, he locks the phone and sets it on the desk, and then grabs his coat, and goes out.

 

* * *

 

It’s been hours since John left and then returned.  He’s cooking now.  Sherlock can smell rotisserie chicken and mushroom risotto.  He can hear John tossing a salad.  No doubt he’s trying to lure Sherlock out of hiding, to soften the blow when he explains gently and with a look of pity in his eyes, that he isn’t  _that way_ , that they can never be anything other than friends, and that, all things considered, perhaps it’s best if he move out, find a place of his own.

Perhaps John will deign to continue on with the cases.  That would be something.  Not enough, but better than nothing.

John is setting the table, he’s putting the finishing touches on the food.  There’s nothing for it.  Sherlock can’t live in his bedroom forever, better to face it, get it over with.  

_Into battle, then._

The flat is oddly dim when he emerges, and for a moment he wonders if it is the middle of the night and he was only dreaming when he heard John come back, if the delicious scents wafting from the kitchen are all some sort of hallucination and he’s finally tipped over the edge.  

But no.  There is a soft, warm flicker coming from the kitchen, and the sudden pop of John uncorking a bottle of wine.

Sherlock’s heart stutters in his chest, even as his brain rails against the evidence set before him: candle light, a proper dinner, a bottle of wine.  Perhaps John has gone out to the pub and brought a woman home?  But, John had said three months ago—no more girlfriends.  He’d said he was getting too old, and didn’t have the energy for dates, and pick ups, and the game of it all.  Still, today had no doubt been very trying…  

Sherlock sniffs the air delicately without detecting even the slightest whiff of perfume.  There is only the scent of John, the dinner he’s prepared, and the fruity tang of the white wine he is currently pouring into two glasses.

Sherlock makes his way to the end of the hall, and stops dead at the entrance to the kitchen.  The only light in the room is that on the vent hood above the cooker, and two candles in the middle of the neatly set kitchen table.  It’s homely, warm, and inviting.

John looks up and sees him standing there.  He smiles.  “Was just going to come and get you.  Got all your favourites.”

“Why?”  Sherlock replies stupidly.  

John’s smile falters for a moment, but then returns when his eyes drop down, and catch sight of Sherlock nervously worrying the cuffs of his dressing gown between his fingers.  “Why not?”

Sherlock feels a surge of panic.  He’s lost.  He knows what it all looks like, but to presume now, would be potentially…  “John, I…”

“Got some candles,” John jerks his chin toward the modest, flickering display.  “You know—it’s more romantic.”  He winks.

Sherlock’s brain goes white, but he’s nodding, somehow, and he’s moving forward, into the room, taking in the food spread out on the table in a vast assortment of proper serving dishes that John has managed to scrounge up from god knows where.  “It’s very…”

“She was right,” John interrupts.  “She was right, you know.  You should have told me.  You could have told me.”

Sherlock feels his eyes fill, and doesn’t know why, but John is looking at him in a way that is unmistakable, and so he nods, tries—for John.  “Yes, I.  I suppose I should have, but I—I couldn’t be sure, and when it comes to this, to us, I would rather err on the side of caution.”

John nods.  “Yeah?  Okay.  I get that.  I—I’m sorry  _I_  wasn’t braver.”

“It’s fine.”

“It’s a lot of wasted time.”

Sherlock swallows back the lump in his throat.  “Yes well—let’s not waste another minute then.  I believe the food is getting cold.”

The smile that spreads across John’s face, is wide and bright, and his eyes look suspiciously full.  “Too right.  I’m starving.”

And when Sherlock smiles back, he feels the weight of so many dark, and lonely years drop from his shoulders, he feels something inside him open wide and flood with relief and joy in equal measure.  “Yes.  Me too.”


	4. Why now?

Sherlock’s breath is sweet with ginger biscuits and warm milk.It wafts gentle over John’s forehead, his eyelashes, his lips.

“Anything?”

John nods.To speak now would be… 

“Why now?”

John shakes his head, eyes still closed, grips the sheets beneath him in white-knuckled fists, and fights the urge to arch his body upward, to meet Sherlock halfway, and never let go again. 

Why?Why now?Why not years ago before the world fell apart around and between them?Why not afterwards?Why not last year?Why not last week?Why not this morning when Sherlock had looked at him across the breakfast table as he fed Rosie, a smile on his lips, and a warmth in his eyes?

“Couldn’t do it anymore.”

Sherlock seems to understand.Fingers ghost along the line of John’s jaw.“I know.” 

And then there are Sherlock’s lips, hot and dry, pressing against the line of his neck, and John lets out a sound like a sob, twists the sheets around his hands, pants and gasps as Sherlock’s lips move up behind his ear, as he hums, deep and low against the skin there, reaches up to card long fingers through John’s hair, until all of John’s head is sheltered over by Sherlock’s hand, and John can’t think of anything at all, but more, and yes, and oh god, please!

Sherlock’s body is a weight beside, and over him.Sherlock’s hands are transport and anchor, giving him wings, rooting him to the bed, to earth, to reality. 

Sherlock’s hand moves, covers John’s heart through his vest—palm hot, fingers splayed.“I can feel your heart.”

“Me too.”John doesn’t know why he says it.Can’t think, can barely keep his mind on the sensation of Sherlock’s hand sliding up his chest, fingers hovering over his lips, hands cupping his face, thumbs tracing the knit line of his brow.

“Open your eyes.”

John thrashes his head from side-to-side.

“Open your eyes.John…”

He opens to sea glass irises framed by inky lashes.

“Hello,” Sherlock murmurs, smiles.

John tries to speak, but his cheeks grow damp instead.

“We don’t have to do this tonight.”Sherlock thumbs away the tears.

“I want…”

“I know.”Sherlock's eyes travel over his face, take in every detail. 

“I want to…”

“Do you trust me?”

John’s breath catches, a surge of adrenaline and arousal racing through his veins.Too much. 

He nods.

Sherlock shifts beside him, lays down, reaches out, and pulls John against him, arms slipping under and around, wrapping him up, tucking John’s head under his chin. 

He stills, and John feels a tension he hadn’t realised he was holding melt from his bones.He shivers, and then settles too.

“Better?”Sherlock mouths against his hair several minutes later.

“Mmm.”

Sherlock’s fingers trace a lazy trail down the length of John’s spine.“Will you stay?”

“Yeah.”

“Just tonight, or…?”Sherlock’s hand stops, fingers restless against John’s back.

“Thought maybe it could be a regular thing.”

“Yes.”

John feels more himself, but still he seeks out Sherlock’s warmth, the long, lean planes of his body, the comfort, the rightness of it.“What I said before…It was true.I have wanted—I do.”

Sherlock draws in a shaking breath, let’s it out slowly.“Me too.”

John smiles against Sherlock’s chest.“Yeah?”

“Yes.John, I…”He sucks in another quavering breath.“What you are—to me…This isn’t a game.This isn’t something for tonight, and then…”

“I know.”

“I love you.”Sherlock’s voice breaks a little in the middle.He sounds afraid, all his confidence of a few moments ago, disappearing on the crest of those words.

John can’t bear it.He pulls back, tilts his chin to look up at Sherlock’s face, suddenly so impossibly young and unsure.“Hey.”

Sherlock can’t meet his eyes.

“Sherlock.Look at me.”And when he finally does John smiles, a small, fond thing, a smile that has only ever belonged between the two of them.“I love you, too.”

The rims of Sherlock’s eyes fill, and glisten.He blinks, nods, and John smiles again.“I’m sorry about before.”

“Why?”

“Don’t know what happened.”

“You were overwhelmed.Not quite panic, but…It’s fine, but—I don’t want it to happen that way.I don’t want it to be that way between us the first time.It’s better to wait.It will happen when it happens.”

“But, I wanted it.”

“I know.”

John goes silent, tucks himself back up against Sherlock’s chest.“I do want you.I’ve wanted you for years.”

“The desire and attraction is quite mutual, I assure you.”

John grins, a little heady at the knowledge.“Yeah?Why didn’t you say something?”

“I couldn’t be sure, and—I didn’t want to ruin what we had.”

“Right…”

Sherlock’s arms tighten around him, pull him closer.“I should have said something.I’m sorry.”

“ _I_ should have said something.I’ve had three years since you came back.I should have said something so many times.”

“Well, the somethings have been said.Let’s leave it now.Do you want to sleep?”John feels Sherlock pull back a little, stare down at the top of his head.

“Mmm.Might do, yeah.”

“Alright.Donovan wants me at the Met bright and early tomorrow—paperwork.You’ll come?”

“‘Course.”

“Good.Thank _you_.”

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For everything.”

Sherlock being Sherlock, John knows he needn’t say more.They fall into that comfortable and familiar silence so unique to them.Sherlock’s breath evens out, his muscles let go, and John feels his own respond in kind.

He isn’t sure which of them drifts off first, but it doesn’t really matter.They’re together.


	5. Simply One Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is an old one, that someone just reblogged on tumblr. I'd forgotten all about it, so I thought I'd add it here.

John sighs, deeply, heavily, as Sherlock slips into bed beside him, the thick, noisy dark of the strange hotel room, hiding them from one another, making it easier and more difficult all at once.  

John’s angry.  Sherlock is fairly certain of that.  At the very least, he’s exasperated.  He knows Sherlock well enough to know that their sleeping arrangement was very likely not the inn’s mistake, no matter how much Sherlock insisted that it was.  

Sherlock made a wager.  He chose dishonesty over courage.  And now he’s paying for it.  Fair enough.  

“John…?”

“What.”

“Are you angry?”

Another sigh.  “What are you on about?”

“You’re angry.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

The mattress shifts.  He can feel John prop himself up on one elbow, to stare down at him, though he can barely see a thing.  “I’m not angry.  I’m—curious.”

A tiny stab of adrenaline races through Sherlock’s veins.  “About what?”  Not good.  He sounds small, and petulant.  He sounds eleven years old.  It’s embarrassing.

“About why you lied—to the front desk clerk, this afternoon, when we were checking in.  Was that for my benefit, or hers?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yes, you do.”

John is different.  He’s different since he came back home.  He’s found his courage somewhere, when it comes to this, when it comes to them.  And Sherlock wants this, too, so why is it still so hard?!

“For her, and for you.”

Sherlock hears the small intake of breath, the way John holds it, and then slowly lets it out again.  He sniffs.  “For her and me?”

“Yes, John.  For her and you.”  Sherlock realises he sounds angry.  (Is he angry?  Why’s he angry?)

“Why?”

“People might talk.”

John gets quiet again.  After a moment he lays back down.  “I don’t care.  I don’t care about that.”  John stretches a little under the covers, and then settles again.  “But you didn’t book a room with two beds, yeah?  The hotel didn’t mess it all up?  You booked a double from the start.”

Sherlock swallows dryly.  Clever.  John is getting much too clever.  In the past he’d have kept this conjecture to himself, but now…  “Maybe.”

“Maybe?”  John sounds more than a little incredulous, but there is an edge of a smile in his voice, as well.  He’s not angry. He’s—amused?

“Fine.  Yes.  I booked one room, one bed, and then I lied about it.  There.  Are you happy?”

“A little.”

Sherlock’s mouth snaps shut, so quickly, he can here the small pop of his own lips as they come together in surprise.

John sighs again, but it sounds fond instead of exasperated.  “You wanted to share a bed with me?”  When Sherlock says nothing, John takes that as a yes.  “Why?”

“I missed you.”

“What?  When?  What do you mean?”

“The last few years.  I’ve missed you.  And now you’re back, I—I don’t like being too far away.  It’s—illogical, I know, but I’m afraid you might disappear when I’m not looking.”

“Oh…”  Soft, and slightly pleased.  “Well, I’m not going anywhere.  You know that right?  I’m staying this time—if that’s alright with you.”

“Of course it’s alright.  Why wouldn’t it be alright?”

“I’m not saying it isn’t.  I’m just checking.”

“Well, it is.”

“Yeah?  Well, good.”

Silence descends between them.  The central heating clicks and whirs through the vent overhead, someone slams a door down the hall, a fox cries somewhere, outside, in the dark.  Sherlock takes a deep breath. He holds it, listens to John’s breathing—even, and calm beside him.

“Breathe, Sherlock.”

Sherlock lets it all go in a soft huff.  “I love you.”

And then John stops breathing.  He’s so still, Sherlock wonders if he has literally shocked him to death.  But now the words are said, Sherlock can’t seem to find the courage to say more.  He never meant to say it.  It just sort of happened, and now…  He waits.

John rolls onto his side.  He’s looking at him, and Sherlock can’t even find the courage to look back.

“I love you, too.”

(John doesn’t understand.  He thinks ‘love’, like you love a friend, and it is that, yes, it is, but it’s more, it’s so much, it’s everything, and John can’t possibly understand that is what he means.  He can’t, because if he did, he would not have said it back, not so easily, not with so much softness, not so matter-of-fact, not so calm.)

“No, John, I mean…”

“I know what you mean.  And I do, too.  I love you.”

(Doesn’t make sense.)

“But, I…”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t, John!  I—I love you.  I love love you.  I love you in all the ways you can love someone.  I…”

“I know.”

And then John is inching closer, so close that Sherlock can feel John’s breath on his neck, so close that if he tilted his chin, just a little to his left, his lips would brush against John’s jaw, and—and—and….

“You’re panicking.”  

(John is so calm.  How is he so calm?)  

“Sherlock?  Sherlock…?”  John sighs.  “Listen, this doesn’t have to change anything—unless you want it to.”  

John waits.  Sherlock says nothing.  Absolutely nothing.  No words, and the absolute worst time for this to happen.  

John sighs again.  “Can you say something—anything?  Just so I know you’re alright.”

(Yes.  He should.  He should say something.  He needs to say something.  Anything.  Just one word…)

“Sex?”

John leans back a little, and laughs.  It’s a small, surprised bark, that trails off into what sounds like a nervous giggle.  “Okay…  What about it?”

“You want it.  Or not…  You seem to, but you’re—scared?”

John swallows tightly, takes a deep breath, and lets it out, again, tickling Sherlock’s earlobe with his breath.  “I don’t know.”

“I don’t know.”

“We both don’t know, then.  That’s—fine.”

“That’s fine?”

“Yeah.  We can figure things out as we go.”

“Yes.  Figure things out as we go.”

John goes quiet for a moment, and then his fingers are weaving between the strands of Sherlock’s hair, and Sherlock’s whole body lights up, tingles, comes alive.  

“Hey…  You okay?”

“Okay?”

“Yeah.  You seem—off?”

“Off?”

John huffs out a small, affectionate laugh that lands on Sherlock’s cheek, and ruffles his eyelashes.  “Yeah.  You’ve been doing nothing but repeating everything I’ve said, for the last minute.”

(Oh… ) “Oh…  Sorry.”  The pads of John’s fingers rub gently against his scalp, and he can’t think.  His eyes slide shut.

“You don’t have to be sorry.  I was just—checking.”

“Mmm…  I’m okay.”

“Okay, good…  Is this okay?  Me touching you like this, okay?”

“Mmm.  Yes.  Okay.”

He feels something let go in John, something that had been holding him taut, and tense, and anxious.  John melts with that simple ‘okay’.  He pulls in a little closer, until the whole of him is pressed up against Sherlock’s side, and he tilts his forehead down to press just above Sherlock’s temple.  His fingers, soothe, and glide.  Everything is soft, and quiet, and still.


	6. I'll Always Stay

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heed the new tags on this one. This touches on the deleted hospital scene in HLV with Magnussen and Sherlock. I don't dwell on it too long, but please be safe if that is triggering for you.
> 
>  **Tags:** #sexual harassment cw, #HLV fix-it, #canon divergence,

MARY.   _“You don’t tell him.  Sherlock…  Do you hear me?  You don’t tell him.  You don’t tell John.”_

Run.

No.  Stay.  Hospital is safer.  Breathe.  Think.  Try to think.

A nurse.  Female.  Twice divorced.  Yes.  No…  Or--maybe?   Dark hair…  Oh.  prick.  poke.  prod.  Flannel in lukewarm water.  Brisk rubbing.  Uncomfortable, unbearable, like mummy’s baths all those years ago.  Rough and efficient.  Dry.  New sheets.  Cold.

Anthea.  Furrowed brow.  Hurried typing.  Tinny sound of Mycroft’s voice over mobile.

_Morphine._

John.  John and Mary.

“You go.  I’m not leaving him.”

“You can’t stay here all night, every night.”

“Why not?”

“John.”

“What.  He needs me.”

“I need you.”

“I’m staying.”

“Then I’m staying.  Go get us some coffee.”

John Leaving.  ( _no_ )  Back of a silver, gold, pewter ( _perfect_ ) head, neck pale, hands fisted.  Walking away.  Gone.

Nurse.  Male.  Forty-three years old.  The beginnings of arthritis in wrists and ankles.   _Morphine…………._

New voice.  This face is different.  Moriarty?  No.   _No, no, no…_ Magnussen.  

Charles Augustus Magnussen. 

(NO)

Too much morphine.  

Move.  Just move!  Limbs lead.  Head cotton.  

Touch.  

Hand lifted, stroked.  Cold and damp.

Shivers over skin.  

Hot breath.  Sour.  

Stomach churning.

Go.  No.  Just try.  Try to reach the morphine, just…

“Oi!  What the fuck…”  John.  ( _john…_ )  Paper cup of tea hitting tile.  “What the fuck are you doing to him?!”  Words.  Shouting.  “Can I get some security in here?!  NOW!  Get out, now, or I swear to god, I will…”  

Nurses.  No.  Security?

Chaos.  People come and go.

Quiet.  Finally.

“Hey…  Sherlock.  Sherlock?  Jesus.”  John’s hands, warm from a paper cup of tea—everywhere.  Blankets lifted, tucked around.  Pic line checked.  Fluttering touches.  Thumbs smoothing damp cheeks.  Fingers in hair.  

Safe.

“Sherlock, I’m just going to turn down your morphine a little bit, okay.  Just a bit.”

Pain.  But the fog lifts.  “ _John._ ”

“Hey…  I’m sorry.  Jesus, I don’t know what…  I shouldn’t have left.  I just went down to get some tea, and…  I’m sorry.”

Sherlock doesn’t know what to say.

John looks stricken.  “Are you…?  Does it hurt.  I can dial you back up.”

Sherlock shakes his head.

“I…”

“You’ve been here.”  Sherlock’s voice is rough with misuse.

“What?  Oh.  Yeah.  Yeah, I’ve been here since they brought you in.”

“When was that?”

“Four days ago.  You—you just about…”

Sherlock lets out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding, and then sucks in another, sharply, on it’s heel, as a stab of pain bursts in his chest and radiates, muscle deep, all the way through to his back.  

For a moment he thinks he may be having a heart attack.  His heart monitor lets out a series of frantic beeps, and John’s eyes flit to the screen, brows knit, mouth a tight line.  But then it passes, and he relaxes again.

“You need to take it easy, okay.  We don’t need to talk.  You need to rest right now.”

“You’ll stay?”

John’s face does something he can’t interpret.  “Yeah.  Of course.  Of course I’ll stay…  I’ll always stay.”

Sherlock nods, his lids heavy, head and chest throbbing.

“Sherlock…  Did you see who shot you?”

The question stutters through Sherlock’s bones, arrests his breath, turns him cold, all over again.  “Later.   _Please._ ”

“Yeah.  Later.”

Sherlock’s morphine pump beeps twice, and the drug settles over him like a heavy blanket, numbing him to the sensation of everything but John—his breathing, the weight of his body, inclined ever so slightly against the side of the mattress as he pulls up a chair beside the bed, the warm weight of his small, capable hand, as it settles over Sherlock’s.

“I’m staying,” the last thing Sherlock hears before sleep takes him.


	7. Untitled (3-30-18)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Tags:** #love confessions, #bed sharing, #sexual negotiation (that ends up with them not having sex).

“Would you ever sleep with me?”

John inhales the tea he’s just taken a sip of, and clatters the cup back into the saucer, sloshing tea over the side and onto the sleeve of his shirt.His eyes are red-rimmed and watering, and his hands shaking by the time he finally manages to catch his breath and put his teacup and saucer back on the table.

“Sorry…Sorry, what?”

“Would you ever sleep with me?And to be clear, I’m using a euphemism.I mean sex.Would you ever share my bed for the purposes of making love?”

John’s mouth hangs open.His eyes are still red-rimmed.His hands still tremble.“I…”

“It’s something I would like to get off the table.Either a yes or a no is acceptable.It needn’t hamper what we are.But, I’ve been thinking about it—for a long time, and I’d like to know.”

“Sherlock, I…”

“A yes or no is sufficient.”

John’s face is doing a million things at once, none of which Sherlock can seem to interpret (frustratingly enough).

“People usually talk about these things.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s kind of a big deal.”

“Yes, I know.”Sherlock sighs in frustration, and rakes a hand through his hair before swinging around to pace into the kitchen and back.“It would not be without—fondness, if that is your concern.I did say ‘make love’ for a reason.”

“Hang on.You love me?”

“Yes, of course I do.I’ve said so.”

John’s eyes drift up and to the side.No doubt he is mulling over every conversation they’ve ever had, or at least the one his limited brain has held onto.“Yeah.I guess.A couple of times, but…Well, I thought you meant…”

“Meant what?!”Sherlock is getting more and more frustrated.Angry at himself, more like.It was a stupid idea!Stupid, to be so forthcoming.

John frowns.“I thought you meant you loved me, not that you were ‘in love’ with me.”

“What’s the difference?”

John shakes his head, and huffs.“Romance.Sex—usually.”

“Ridiculous.”

“Why’s it ridiculous.I thought you just said you wanted to shag me.”

“No.I asked if you would ever consider making love to me.”

The room goes quiet. 

Sherlock takes a deep breath to calm his racing heart, lets it out slowly.He’s just given far too much away. “You’ve romanced and shagged a whole string of girlfriends over the years.Are you telling me you loved every single one?”

“No.”

“Well then, I would think that you would be clever enough to see the value of love over ‘in love’ whatever that means.I do.I love you, and I’m asking if you would ever want to…”And suddenly the full weight of what he’s done, what he is asking hits him.This could end things.John could leave. 

John is getting up out of his chair.John COULD leave.

John doesn’t leave.He walks over and looks down at Sherlock’s hands, which, Sherlock suddenly realises, his is using to worry the overlong sleeves of his dressing gown.John reaches out and takes them in his.“I might want to.”His eyes are full again, and Sherlock doesn’t know if that is a good or bad thing.

“Might?”

“Might.This is important to me, okay.You’re important to me.We’re important to me.I just—I’m asking you to slow down a little bit.”

“I believe that six years is acceptably slow.”

“Six y…?Wait, are you saying you’ve wanted this from the minute we met?”John’s thumbs rub a subconscious crescent over the top of Sherlock’s hands.

All Sherlock can manage is a shrug.He can feel his cheeks going hot, and his eyes pricking. _Stupid!_

John nods.“Okay.Yeah, okay, but I didn’t know, did I?And maybe that was a bit me, and maybe that was a bit you, but—all that doesn’t matter now.I’m telling you, I didn’t know, and I’m asking you if we can slow down.”

Sherlock nods.“Of course.”

John’s hold on his hands tightens.“I’m not saying ‘no’.I’m saying give me time to let it settle.”

And Sherlock doesn’t know what to say or do then.He’d not really thought this far, and even if he had, he doubts that he could have imagined any scenario quite like this.

John lets go of his hands, and it takes everything in Sherlock’s power to not snatch them back, press them to his cheek, his chest, his lips, to not say all the things he has been holding back for six years, all the things he is still holding back, may always be holding back.

“I do love you.”Sherlock’s eyes snap up to John’s face, and John smiles—that crooked, fond, slightly sad smile that only seems reserved for Sherlock.“I love you.I do.I just—I don’t know how to do this, and I don’t want to ruin it.”

“What makes you think I know?”

‘Well—you were doing the asking, I just thought…”

“Well, you thought wrong.”

“Oh.”

“Yes.Quite.”

John nods.Goes quiet again.Sherlock can tell he’s thinking even though his eyes are on the floor.When he finally looks up it’s clear he’s made a decision.“I’d like to sleep with you, yeah.Sleep—no euphemism.Can we start there, maybe?”

Sherlock nods because it is more than he ever could have hoped, and now he has it, he doesn’t know what to do.“Now?”

The corner of John’s mouth twitches upward.“It’s a little early, but—yeah.Now if you like.”

“I would like.”

John smiles properly then.“Mine or yours?”

“Mine.Your sheets are awful.”

John chuckles, and looks away, suddenly shy.“Not going to ask how you know that.”

Sherlock reaches down and takes John’s hand back.“Come then.Leave the lights on.You may change your mind in the middle of the night.I have the tendency to migrate.”

John let’s himself be led.“That so?”

“Yes.And I run cold, and you run hot, so I imagine there may be a blanket issue.”

“Guess we’ll have to work it out.”

“Indeed.”Sherlock stops in front of the bedroom door, to stare down at John.“Thank you.”

“For what?”

“This.It’s been lonely since you came home—at night.I miss you when you sleep.”

John swallows tightly.“I miss you too.”And Sherlock can see the aching sincerity in it, the truth of it.

“Then I was right to ask?”

“Yeah.It’s good.You were right to ask.”


	8. Not This Time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Additional tags for this chapter:** #love confessions, #internalised homophobia, #mild past infant death reference, #post S3, #canon divergent.
> 
>  **Author's Note:** This takes place sometime after HLV. Both Mary and the baby are dead.
> 
> Since so many people expressed interest in what comes next, this ficlet has now become a fully fleshed out fic called: **Enough is Enough.** Chapter two picks up right after this, and can be found [HERE](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14687871/chapters/33936996).

John is utterly exhausted. 

It’s his first case back now that he and Sherlock are...Well, he’s not sure what they are, but they share a flat again, and there nights of John picking out films he thinks will amuse Sherlock, and Sherlock deducing the plot in the first 5 minutes and then shouting at the telly for the rest of it, there are late night picnics of Thai takeaway in front of the hearth, and there is the sound of Sherlock’s violin lulling John to sleep again., and John ignoring body parts in the crisper again, and Mrs. Hudson’s tea waiting whenever they happen to get up.It’s almost like old times—almost.

Something has shifted between them, that much is clear.They aren’t the same people they were all those years ago when they first shared a flat.They’ve seen things they never wanted to see, and they’ve survived things no one should have to survive, and they’ve lost—oh how they’ve lost—so very, very much.And it sits on their shoulders, making their steps a little slower, their hair a little greyer, their vision a little blurry around the edges.They can’t eat takeaway five days in a row anymore, they can’t pull all-nighters without a headache the next day, and they can’t chase shadowy figures down damp cobblestone streets for miles without feeling it for days afterwards, apparently.

John hisses at the sharp stab of pain in his thigh, as he follows in Sherlock’s wake down the small footpath through the woods.They’re in West Sussex, and Sherlock had swore up and down that morning, that Jack Ferguson would be somewhere in these woods, and yet—here they are, and there’s nothing but birdsong and the soft rustle of leaves.

Sherlock glances back over his shoulder with a roll of his eyes.“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“You’re getting old.”

“Oi!”John forces himself to stand a little straighter, and instantly regrets it.“At least, I’m not the one secretly dying their hair at three in the morning, and then attempting to hide the evidence.”

Sherlock spins around and stops dead, looking thoroughly scandalised. 

John just grins.“Yeah.I know about that.I know what hair dye smells like, and you did a bloody poor job of covering it up.You’re not the only one with deductive skills, you know.”

Sherlock pouts.“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”But John sees the corners of his mouth twitch, and the way he self-consciously lifts a hand to his hair as he turns and sets off down the path again. 

John feels a momentary twinge of fondness, a fondness he’s been allowing himself to indulge in more and more, of late.One more thing that’s changed.But this change is one that _does_ harken back to those early days, and John finds he doesn’t mind.More than that, he finds he wants it.The anger and bitterness had begun to be too heavy a burden, and no matter how painful the thought of his feelings never fully being returned may be, it’s still easier to bear than the rage, regret and self-loathing.Sherlock wants him here at his side, he’s made that amply clear, on more than one occasion, since John moved back, and that’s enough.

It’s turning into a beautiful day.One of those late Spring days that starts off cool in the morning, but almost feels like summer by noon.Sherlock starts to shrug out of his coat and jacket as the trail ascends a small hill, and John smiles at the line of sweat soaking through the fine, white, silk-cotton blend of his shirt.He’d told him he was over dressed, but Sherlock hadn’t listened, as always, and now he’s paying the price.

“Warm?”

“Mmm?”

“You.You’re hot.I told you you would be.It’s supposed to get up in the mid twenties this afternoon, and here you are plodding around the back country in a full suit and wool coat.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re sweating.”

Sherlock stops as they mount the top of the hill and exit the cover of the trees.“Yes, well—even I display signs of being human sometimes, it seems.”He rolls his shoulders a little betraying his own aches and pains, and then takes a deep breath and lets it out with contented sigh.“Will you look at that.”He nods toward the vista spread out below them: rolling, brilliant-green farmland threaded through with ribbons of trees and dotted here and there with small, stone villages and snowy flocks of sheep.There’s a slight breeze up in the open, and as the clouds skitter by, their shadows trail over the pastoral patchwork below.“Lovely, isn’t it.”

It is.It is lovely.But John isn’t used to Sherlock noticing or calling out such things, and it makes that seemingly bottomless font of fondness well up in his chest all over again, tight and nearly overwhelming.“Thought you hated the country.”

“Not true.”

“I seem to remember you saying something about it being more dangerous and crime-ridden than the city.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”Sherlock pulls his eyes away from the landscape, and gives John a wink.“Let’s stop for awhile.”

“What?Here?”

“Yes, why not?”

“Thought we were meant to be looking for Jack.”

“Oh,” Sherlock waves his hand dismissively.“He’s probably back at the house by now.”

“Wait.Did we come all the way out here just for a morning stroll?”

Sherlock doesn’t reply, only throws his coat down over the damp grass, and sits down on one side, leaving room for John, should he want to join him.After rolling up the cuffs of his shirt, he crosses his legs, and leans forward, elbows on knees, chin resting on the heel of one hand, and stares out at the scenery.

John looks out, and tries to figure out just what it is that’s captured Sherlock’s attention.There’s nothing out of the ordinary, only the rolling fields and woods.With a sigh, he lowers himself down onto the other side of Sherlock’s coat with a groan.

Sherlock’s eyes dart over at the sound, before returning to the landscape.“You need to keep moving.It’s my fault.I’ve not been running you enough.We’ll take more cases.”

“You don’t need to nurse me.I’m not an invalid.”

“Didn’t say you were.”

John huffs, and lays back to stare up at the sky.“It was implied.”

“No.I only meant that you get stiff when you sit about too long, and you’re better when you get more exercise.It’s my job to keep you busy, and I’ve been neglecting it.”

“Your job?!Since when?”

Sherlock looks back at him.“It’s why you came back, isn’t it?”

John let’s his eyes slide shut, and doesn’t say anything in return.

“You were bored, restless.I provide—distraction.”

John frowns, and cracks his eyes open, squinting up at Sherlock’s serious face.“You think I wanted to come back because I was bored?”

Sherlock just shrugs.

John huffs.“No.That’s not why I came back.”

“Oh.”Sherlock tucks his knees up against his chest, crosses his arms over them, and turns away again, resting his head on his knees, staring off at nothing in particular.He looks deceptively young, folded into himself, back and the curls at his nape damp with sweat.John wants to…He wants to do something, something to make this thing between them, whatever it is, right.

“I came back because I missed it.”

Sherlock’s head pops up, but he doesn’t turn to meet John’s eye.“It?”

“You.Us.”

Sherlock does look over then, but only for a moment.He doesn’t say anything, and John knows that he only has two choices now: backtrack and try to undo it, or forge ahead.

“I missed you.I missed living with you.I missed everything we had when we lived together, before...”He takes a deep breath, and lets his eyes slide shut again.“I missed everything, and I hoped—I hoped we could pick up where we left off.And I know, I know that too much has happened, that it will never be like it was, but I guess I hoped that maybe we could find out what it is now, and that we could start from here and build something else, something new maybe.I—I don’t know.”He flings an arm over his eyes.“I’m just going to shut up now.”

There is a soft rustle of long limbs unfolding, and waft of air as Sherlock lays down beside him.John’s breath catches.He waits.“We can.”

John remembers to breathe, he turns his head, opens his eyes.“Yeah?”

Sherlock’s eyes are soft, and there is the hint of a smile playing around his lips.“Yes.”

John swallows, his throat suddenly tight.“You know you’re my best friend right?You know I’m here with you because I want to be, because I just like being with you?”

Sherlock blinks, and to John’s wonder and surprise, his cheeks turn pink, and his eyes fill.He sucks in a shaking breath, blinks once, and then sits up so suddenly, John thinks he’s been bitten by something.

“Here, what’s gotten into you?”

Sherlock’s already moved a few steps away, and is pacing at the crest of the hill.“We should go back.If Jack’s returned to the house and his father hasn’t returned from town, he shouldn’t be alone with his step-mother, or the baby.”

“What?Why?”

“Jealousy.”

“Sorry, what?”John struggles to his feet with a wince.

Sherlock spins around.“Jealousy, John!Murderous jealousy!Don’t you see?!”His eyes spill over.

John frowns, totally thrown at the sudden change of topic.“What?You’re saying Jack’s the one making his brother sick?”

“Of course.It’s obvious.He’s always been a solitary boy.You know his father said he never had any friends at school, solitary pursuits, and then the trouble with the drugs after the accident.He’s injured trying to protect his mother, and she dies anyway, abandons him, and his father remarries, and then suddenly there’s a wife, and a baby, essentially taking his father away too, and Jack is left alone, wholly alone.”Sherlock frowns, and stares down at the sod beneath their feet as though it might somehow offer up answers.“For some reason he chooses to focus all that pain and resentment on the baby…”

“How?”

“I don’t know, but we need to go back, now!”

“Yeah, yeah.Okay.”

Sherlock strides back toward him, scoops up his coat and heads for the woods.

“Sherlock wait.Wait!”John finally catches up with him and reaches out to grab his arm just before he reaches the trees.“Stop!”

“John!”

“You can wait one minute.Look at me.” 

Sherlock looks everywhere but at him.Finally his eyes settle somewhere around John’s clavicle, and John decides it’s enough.“Tell me you know you’re my best friend.”

“Of course.You’ve said so before, and now is really not the time…”

“Yeah, I said it before.But that was ‘before’.Before everything, and I need you to know that you still are, that you’ll always be, and I need you know…”

“John, is this really necessary.There is an infant’s life in danger, and I would think that you of all people would…”John feels the words like a punch in the gut, and he sees the minute Sherlock registers what he’s said.His eyes to flicker up to meet John’s then, stricken, as his lips part.

“Don’t.Don’t do that.”

“Sorry.”It’s barely a whisper, but Sherlock’s eyes are full again, sincere.

“Look at me.”

“John, I…”

“Please.”

It looks almost agonising, but Sherlock does lift his eyes and hold John’s gaze.He swallows tight and dry, and tries to momentarily quell the nervous energy vibrating from every cell.

John takes a deep breath.“Tell me you know I love you.”

Sherlock’s lip trembles.

“I do, you know.I love you, and I know you don’t—do that, and I don’t have any expectations, okay, I just—I needed you to know that I’m not just back because it’s convenient, or because I need an adrenaline hit, or even just because I’m lonely.I’m back because—I’m always better when I’m with you, and I want to be given the chance to be the friend I haven’t been, and should have been, the last few years.

Sherlock shivers, and John feels his heart sink into his stomach.“Christ, you’re right, this isn’t the time, and I’m—I’m sorry.I’m a mess right now, and I can’t seem to…Listen, I just wanted you to know that I’m not going anywhere, that I care about…”

“I do.”Sherlock looks stunned at the words that have just come out of his mouth.

“Sorry?”

“I do.You said you know I don’t do that, but I do.”

John’s stomach flips, like he’s just stepped off a cliff into nothing but air and he’s hanging, suspended, for that microsecond before he starts to plummet.He opens his mouth to say something, anything, but nothing comes out.

“I know, John.I know you lo—, and I do, too—you, I mean.I mean, I feel the same towards you.And I—I know you don’t do that, not with—people like me.I know.It seeps out of you, John.Did you know that?It’s always there, it’s always been there, I’ve always seen it, but it was always easier, safer for you when it was me who didn’t do that.No choice to make.And it was fine, because for a long time I didn’t know what I wanted either, and then when I did it was too late.But I need you to know the truth now, and I need you to know that I know.I know, John, and it’s fine.It’s all fine.Whatever you want this to be—it’s fine.”

Sherlock is breathing hard, like he’s just run a marathon, and maybe he has in a way, maybe they both have. 

“What do you mean, it seeps out of me?What does?”

“Everything.Everything you feel, think—want.”Sherlock lifts a hand and subconsciously rubs his chest, just over his heart, in exactly the spot where Mary’s bullet almost took him away for good.And John feels like running, falling, just—stopping.Because nothing makes sense, and there’s nowhere to hide from it.He’s gone and done this to himself, and he’s terrified, but god help him, he doesn’t regret a thing.

He needs to say something. He needs to say something, or do something before Sherlock gets the wrong idea, and gets that look he gets sometimes, the one that feels like it’s driving something sharp and acidic through the core of John’s heart, that makes him regret ever having been born because his existing means that Sherlock is hurting, and there is nothing more unacceptable than that, nothing more…

“We need to go.The baby, John.”

And this is Sherlock doing what he always does.This is Sherlock making it easy for him.“Yeah.Right.”

“Come on.”Sherlock’s shirt is clinging to his back with sweat, as he turns away.And it’s not just the heat, John thinks.This wasn’t easy for him.This was perhaps even more difficult for him than it was for John to be the one to break the ice and finally say the things that needed saying.And now John is letting him just walk away, letting him make it easy, like he always does.

“Sherlock.”He hurries after him, reaches out, pulls their bodies together and presses his face into Sherlock’s neck when he lifts his arms to wrap around John’s back.“Let’s talk later.Promise me we’ll talk later—when we get back to the inn.”

“Yes.That would be…Yes, we should.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since so many people expressed interest in what comes next, this ficlet has now become a fully fleshed out fic called: **Enough is Enough.** Chapter two picks up right after this, and can be found [HERE](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14687871/chapters/33936996).


	9. Untitled 7/20/18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Additional Tags for this Chapter:** Drug Use

The day John finds the syringes in the the desk drawer, they’ve both been running on empty, running for weeks, running in circles, away from one another, and he’s hardly got anything left.  He doesn’t have anything left for this.  Not this.  Not now.

“What is this?”  He’s standing in the doorway to the kitchen.  He’s looking at Sherlock, frenetic, buzzing at 6:00 am on a Saturday morning.  He knows what it is.  He knows.  But he needs to hear him say it.

When Sherlock looks up, he looks guilty, but John knows he wanted John to find it.  John did, so he wanted it to happen.

“What is it?” John repeats, and for a moment he thinks Sherlock is going to cry.

“What does it look like?”  All acid and sarcasm.

John shakes his head.  “We’re not doing this again.  Where’s the rest of it.”

Sherlock ignores him, goes back to whatever it is he’s doing with shaking hands and slightly dilated pupils.

“You ignoring me then?”  John sniffs and nods once, looks down at the syringes and two small vials in his hand.  “Right then.  This is what we’re doing now.  Okay.  So you don’t mind if I just…”  He starts to roll up his sleeve, peels open the package with the syringe head, holds the vial up to the light.  Sherlock lets him get as far as filling it and lowering it to his arm before…

“Stop!”

John looks up, needle still hovering threateningly close to his arm.  “Why?  Always together, isn’t that what you said to me six months ago?  Together or not at all.  You promised.  We vowed, so…  This is what we’re doing now, it seems.”

Sherlock’s eyelashes flutter, his lips tremble once before he swallows dryly.  “Don’t.”

“You don’t.”

“I—I had to, John.  You don’t understa…”

“Nope.  No.  Why is it okay for you and not for me, eh?”

“John, I…”

“Why, Sherlock?”

Sherlock’s mouth opens and closes in quick succession.

“Why?!”

“It’s different!!”

“Why?”

“Because I love you!”

John lets the needle fall away from his arm.  “And I love you, which is why you need to bloody well learn to love yourself.”

Sherlock’s eyes are dark and full.  John just sighs and tosses the items in his hand on the table as he strides over, steps into the V of Sherlock’s legs and pulls him against his chest.  “You’re a bloody idiot.”  He can feel the front of his shirt growing warm and wet.  “How much?”

“The usual.”  Mumbled into the fabric.

“And for how long?”

“Thursday, and then again today.”

“More than one dose?”

Sherlock nods.

“Why?”

Sherlock shakes his head over John’s heart.

“Sherlock, you have to try.  Remember what Ella said.  Now, why?”

“This case.”

“What about it?”

“I’m failing.  I—I can’t do it.  I can’t solve it, and there are children, John, children who…”

“Then let me help.”

“What can you do?”

“Oi!”  John pulls back, and knots Sherlock’s curls in his fist.  

Sherlock’s cheeks flush even as his eyes drop.

“Let me help.” John murmurs, letting go, and smoothing a hand over the unkempt riot.

Sherlock nods.

“How long ago did you take the last dose?”

“A half hour ago.”

“It wearing off then?”

“Mm.”

“Take a break.  Come have a bath with me, and then we’ll eat some breakfast, and we’ll work on it together.”

Sherlock nods.  He still can’t meet his eye.  “Yes.  Alright.”

John rubs the pads of his fingers against Sherlock’s scalp.  “Look at me.”

Sherlock draws in a shaking breath and does, and John forces a crooked smile in return.  “You don’t have to save the world, you know.  I love that about you.  I love that you want to, that it’s important to you, but…  It doesn’t matter to me that you solve them.  It’s never mattered to me.  What matters to me is that you want to, and I love you.  I love you whether you solve them or not.  I’d love you if you wanted to give the whole damn thing up.  So just—stop doing this to yourself.”

The tears in Sherlock’s eyes spill over, and John reaches down to thumb them from his cheeks.  “Come on, then.  I’ll even let you use my sandalwood bathbomb.”

“The one that makes you smell like sex?”

John chuckles.  “The one that’s going to make us both smell like sex.  Might even result in some later, if you’re up for it.”

“Mmm…”  It’s noncommittal, and it doesn’t matter.  John knows he never wants it during a case, but the flirtation and the firm but gentle admonition and acceptance seems to be doing it’s work.  Sherlock looks visibly lighter.

It won’t lift overnight.  Sherlock will be in one of his moods for a few days more, at the very least, but hopefully he knows now.  Hopefully he knows that John was just as serious as Sherlock on that glorious, sunny morning in June, when they stood side-by-side in front of friends and family, and vowed to never be apart again, to never take one another for granted, to always lift the other up, to hold them up when they were slipping.

This morning was the slipperiest slope they’ve encountered since that day, but here they are talking about it, dealing with it, stripping naked, and letting the warm, fragrant water of the bath help to wash away the last of the fear, and the anger, and desperation.  They’re handling it.  They’re keeping their promises.

It’s something John never thought himself capable of—either of them really, but here they are, and they’re doing it.  They’re loving one another, and it’s a gift.

 

 


	10. Safe

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Additional tags for this chapter:** complex ptsd, abuse mention,

The knock at the door is a surprise and it isn’t.

Sherlock sits up in the dark.“John?”

“Can I come in?”John’s voice sounds—not right, somehow.

“Yes.”

The door cracks open.John is just a silhouette.“Umm…”John swallows.“This is going to sound strange, but do you think that I could…?”his voice catches, and Sherlock throws back the covers on the side of the bed nearest to the door. 

John crawls in without another word.He curls up tight.He always sleeps on his back, but he curls up tight.He’s facing Sherlock, but it’s hard to see his face.

“Dreams?”

“Yeah.”Strained and wet.

John is shaking.Sherlock can feel it through the mattress.He’s been bad again lately, it’s why he’d moved back to Baker St. at long last, and today was a therapy day.

“Come here.”

John sniffs, and wipes at his nose with the back of his hand.“What?”

“Come here.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to help.”

“What do you mean?”

They don’t do this, they don’t put things into words, but it’s important to John, in this moment.He’s fraying, everything is uncertain and unreal.He needs something solid, something honest.He needs something—someone—he can trust.

“I—I thought it might help to have something, someone, to hold onto for a while.Until it passes.”

There is a moments pause.John considering. 

He slides over.He lets Sherlock pull him into his arms, against his chest, head tucked under Sherlock’s chin, Sherlock’s breath in his hair.Every muscle in his body is taut.Fight or flight.Adrenaline still coursing through his veins.

Sherlock rubs his back, because it’s what you do when someone needs comfort, and John does.He clearly does.He wants to tell him it’s alright, but it really isn’t. 

John’s arm snakes around his waist, pulls him crushingly close, and he shakes, and shakes, and shakes.

“You can stay, John.As long as you like.”At the flat.In his bed.In his arms.“You can stay.”

John lets out a strange sound, almost like a laugh, but it’s not, because John is clinging tighter, shaking more, and Sherlock wishes that he knew exactly what he had been dreaming, how to make it better, but if he knows one thing by now, it’s that nothing really helps.It’s better to just let it pass, and if he can be this for John in the midst of it, then he will.

“Your safe now.”

John shudders and sighs.His muscles loose. 

“You’re safe.”Sherlock repeats, breathes into his hair, strokes his back. 

“You’re safe,” whispered again as John’s breathing finally starts to slow, as his grip around Sherlock’s waist loosens.

His lips are in John’s hair, and John’s are against his chest, breath warm and even, tickling the sparse hair there.Until finally…“Everyone thinks it was Afghanistan.”

“Mmm.”Sherlock hums against his scalp.

“It’s not.”

“I know.”

“It was worse when you jumped.”

“I know.”

“But it’s not just that.”

“Yes.”

John stirs a little, but he doesn’t pull away.“Just what is it you think you know?”

“Is that how you want it?”

“Tell me.”It’s quiet, but desperate.

Sherlock presses his mouth against John’s head.“You dream of when you were a boy.Those are the worst dreams.”

John grows tense again, sucks in a shaking breath..“Yeah…” whispered on the inhale, puffed out again, against Sherlock’s skin like a sob, the tension washing away with it, just as quickly as it had come. 

“But you’re safe now.”

“Doing what we do?”

“John.”He pulls back a little, tilts his chin down, and John blinks up at him, barely visible in the black of the room.“You’re safe.We’re safe.I promise.”And Sherlock hopes he understands, hopes he can see the sincerity, the commitment to building something new, something better than they had had before Sherlock had died, and John had grieved, and the world had fallen apart around them.“I realise it’s more than a little presumptuous, all things considered, but I’m asking you to trust me.”

“Let me stay.”John buries his face in Sherlock’s chest.“Just—I need to know you need me.”

“I do.Very much.”

John nods against his chest.“I need you too.”Barely a whisper.

“Good.”

John huffs against his skin, and this time it isn’t a sob.

“Can I stay here tonight?”

“Tonight, or any night you might find you have the need.”

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

They lie still and quiet, and Sherlock almost thinks John is asleep, when…“Sherlock?”

“Mmm?”

“It’s good to be home.There’s never been anywhere else that felt that way but here, and…It’s good to be home.”John curls back against him, his breath eventually evening out into the cadence of sleep. 

They fall asleep—safe together.


	11. Ghosts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a little Halloween something. It was going to be fluff, but it ended up getting a bit creepy in the middle. Warning for the #ghosts of gays past, #possession, and #John Watson being a badass who would do anything, including going head-to-head with a ghost, to protect the man he loves.

“There are no such thing as ghosts.”

“But you’re scared.”

“I am not!”

John grins.Sherlock is doing his best at appearing scandalised at the suggestion, but the fact still remains that he’s skittish, and tense, and is walking a great deal closer to John than he normally would. 

They’re not even here at this crumbling and supposedly haunted manor house, on Halloween, in the middle of a storm and power outage, because of the ghosts.It’s a murder investigation.But if the stories are true, then the murder of Geoffrey Edwards isn’t the first to have occurred between these walls, and John is rather convinced that they may just have some otherworldly companions following them about the narrow corridors, through the great galleries, and currently, beneath the rain-mottled glass ceiling of the conservatory.

“Right.Did sound like moaning, though.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.It’s the wind.This is an old house.Old houses talk.”

John cocks a brow.Rather poetic language for Sherlock.

“Could be old Mr. Edwards, or his son.Late 19th century, wasn’t it?”

“Wasn’t what?”

“When he was run through out there in the gallery, by his vengeful son, William.”

“Good lord, what have you been reading?”

“There’s a website.It’s all there for anyone to read.The old man caught William with his lover, had the bloke arrested, sent to prison.He died there, and then William came back here one dark and stormy night, and ran his dad through with one of the prized family swords hanging out there in the gallery.The older brother turned around and shot William, of course.It was all pretty dramatic.Very Shakespeare.”

Sherlock’s eyes flick away, clearly perturbed that John has done research that he has not.“Ludicrous.”

“Just the wind.Right.Got it.”

John shakes off the gooseflesh still clinging to his skin, takes a deep breath, and moves toward the door, and the entrance to the gallery.“Right, well, we should go take a look though, yeah?Just what exactly are we looking for, anyway?”

“I’ll know it when I see it.”

This means Sherlock doesn’t have a clue, and the petulant tone is in full swing now.It’s going to be a long night!

John steps out into the gallery, and stares down the gaping stretch of room.The dark grey panelled walls and rows of family portraits fade away into a black maw near the end of the hall.There are windows on one side, but it is so overcast outside, that they do nothing to cut through the thick black.It’s the sort of velvety dusk that can play tricks on the eyes, and John fights instinct, willing himself not to spook over what looks like a dark shadow moving at the far end of the room.

“Hello?”

“Shh!”Sherlock hisses, and reaches out to grab his arm.

The shadow stops.John lets his hand slip down to the pistol tucked under his belt.Useless against ghosts, but if it’s an intruder…

“There’s someone down there.I’m going in,” John whispers.

Sherlock’s hand tightens on his shoulder.“No.Don’t.”

“I’m armed.I’ll hug the wall.It will be fine.”

“Why didn’t you bring a torch?”Sherlock hisses in his ear.“You always forget a torch.”

Definitely scared, then…

John presses himself against the mahogany panelling of the walls.“Hello?Come out.We just want to talk.”

There is a sound from the end of the gallery, like fabric sliding across wood, and then a loud clatter.

Sherlock starts and John can hear him breathing quick and shallow behind him.“Stop talking to it.”

“It?”John smiles.

“Them.”Sherlock clarifies, sounding caught-out.

“We don’t mean you any harm.Just want to ask you a few questions,” John calls down the corridor again.

“For god sake!!” Sherlock hisses.

There is the sound of a chair scraping along the wood floor, and then the shadow moves again.John’s eyes have adapted well enough now, that it is clear that it is the shape of person.Given the height and build, he would guess a man—short, but powerfully built.He reaches down and pulls the gun from his belt, switching the safety off.“Just come out!”He calls.

Suddenly, he realises that Sherlock is pushing away from the wall, and striding into the middle of the corridor like the utter madman he is. 

“Sherlock!”John whispers in warning, but it’s too late.

“ENOUGH GAMES!”Sherlock bellows into the darkness.“COME OUT NOW!”

The blackness at the end of the corridor seems to shudder and move, and then, without warning, it dissipates like the dissolving of a morning fog, leaving the shadow of the man clearly visible.He surges forward, straight toward Sherlock at incredible speed, and John only just has time to lunge out into the room and shout a warning for him to stop, before he’s on them.

John braces himself for the impact of muscle and bone, but instead is met with a slap of icy cold air, and a twisting nausea that forms instantly in his gut.He spins around, looking for their assailant, but he’s vanished—seemingly into thin air.The room is still and quiet, except for the sound of Sherlock dropping onto his arse on the floor beside him with an odd, strangled sound.

“Jesus.”

“John.John, I…”Sherlock sounds not at all himself.

“What?”John swings around, checking every corner he can see through the black of the room.There’s nothing but the wind outside, and the last, clinging vestiges of something that feels almost like an emotional fog, treacle-thick and cloying, that seems to wrap tight around John’s throat, making it hard to breathe.

“What—what is it?What is it?!”

John giggles, high and hysterical.It couldn’t be, but—but it was.“I think that was the ghost of William Edwards.”

“No.No.Stupid.Impossible!”Sherlock’s voice breaks with a gasp, and enough of John’s presence of mind returns for him to realise that Sherlock is swiftly spiralling into a panic.He turns and drops to his knees.Reaches out for Sherlock’s hands.They’re ice cold, and Sherlock yanks them from his the moment they touch. 

John scowls.“Hey.You okay?”

“Don’t be mad!”

“Don’t be a dick.”

Sherlock’s mouth clamps shut.

“You okay?I’m going to touch you, okay.”

“Why?”

“Your hands felt cold.”

“It’s cold.”

“It’s not.I think you might be in shock.”

“DON’T TOUCH ME!”

John is surprised at the level of venom in it.He sits back on his heels.“Get up.We’re going back to the kitchens.At least there was a fire lit down there.”

“I’m not leaving this room.”It doesn’t sound like Sherlock anymore, and John has to fight back a shiver.

“I’m going back to the kitchen and you’re coming with me.”

“No.I’m staying here.”

It doesn’t sound like Sherlock at all.John pushes down the panic he can feel blooming in his chest, a deep-seated, feral thing, born of childhood warnings from his nanna, and stories of exorcisms from the local priest who had been a bit of a nut, and had been shipped off to the northern most tip of the Hebrides by the time John was in second form.

John takes a few deep breaths, calms himself with logic.This is Sherlock panicking.He’s been like this before.it’s fine.Tread carefully.

“I’m going to the kitchen.”

“Good.Get out.”

John gets to his feet and stares down at Sherlock sitting on the floor, knees splayed open as he leans back on one hand.It’s not the stance of someone panicking.It’s relaxed, almost louche.He frowns.

“Sherlock is coming with me.”He tries, feeling an idiot.

“I think not.”

John feels his blood run cold.“What did you say?”

Sherlock looks up at him with an expression, that though concealed by the dark, doesn’t look like anything John has ever seen on his face before.“You may go.He stays.”

“This isn’t funny.”

“Appropriate, as it wasn’t meant as humour.”

“Sherlock, stop it.”

“Sherlock is elsewhere at the moment.”

John sniffs and swallows down the panic, sublimates it into his default rage.“This isn’t funny.Stop it.It’s cold up here, and there’s nothing more to be found.Now let's go back to the kitchens and then get the bloody hell out of here.”

“Not very well mannered for a valet, are you?”

“Oh, so that’s what you think of me, is it?”He sniffs again.“Nice.”

“If you mean him, then no, he seems to think rather more.Oh…”

“Oh?”

Sherlock, or—whoever it is he’s currently talking to, smiles.“Yes.Oh.”

When no further explanation is forthcoming, John huffs.“What do you want?”

“Just this.A voice.The warmth of a human body.And what a voice, what a body.”

John’s eyebrows rise to his hairline.

The thing grins through the mask of Sherlock’s features.It’s unsettling.“You don’t think so?”

“Why should I tell you anything?You’ve just inhabited the body of my friend—without his consent.I’d kill you if you weren’t already dead.”

“What makes you think it was without his consent?Maybe he longs to be filled by a man.”

It takes every ounce of John’s not inconsiderable self-restraint to keep himself from reaching out and slamming his fist into the man’s face, but it’s Sherlock’s face, so restrain himself, he must.“Let him go.”He grinds out, through clenched teeth.“Let him go, or I swear to God.”

The man laughs bitterly.“God?There is no god.Only this.Only us.”

“Let him go.I won’t ask you again.”

“And if I won’t?What will you do then, mm?”

“I was raised Catholic,” John brandishes the toothless claim like a weapon.He feels a fool, but he’s caught out, helpless, and it’s all he has.

“Ooo.Oh no.”The thing is mocking him now.

“Listen, who are you?William Edwards?”

“Billy to my friends.But you can call me William.”

“You understand you can’t just stay like this.He’s strong.He’s going to fight you.”

“He’s surprisingly docile.I believe I’ve quite overwhelmed that oversized brain of his.Like a terrified lamb, he is.But you—you’re something altogether different.Bit of the working class tough in you, isn’t there?”

“You want to find out?”

The man grins.“You won’t hurt him, and you can’t hurt me without hurting him, so here we are…What should we do about it, do you think?”

“You already know what I think.”

He grins lasciviously.“I know what he thinks.”

John knits a brow.

“Oh, you wouldn’t believe the things he thinks, Doctor Watson…Oh.Oh no, it’s _Captain_ , isn’t it.”

“Both actually.”

“Yes.Quite.”

“Listen, I’m not leaving here without him, so you either get out, or you’re stuck with me.”

“I could think of worse things.”

The man’s suggestive tone is equal parts infuriating and intoxicating, and John tries not to think about what his response to it might mean.

“You want him as much as he wants you, it seems.”

“Shut it.”

“Oh come now, if you know who I am then you know there is no need for that sort of delicacy around me.We can speak frankly.”

“Did it ever occur to you that maybe I don’t want to talk to you at all?”

“Exceptionally rude, aren’t you.It’s what he likes about you, I’d wager.You’re not the sort one brings home to Daddy.”

“Let’s not make this about you.”

Sherlock scrambles to his feet.It’s awkward and uncoordinated, like maybe the thing possessing him has forgotten how to be in a body, but he advances on John just fine once he finds his balance.“You leave Teddy out of this!”

“Was that his name?”

Now he is looming over John he seems to loose some of his fire.He shrinks, looking suddenly and impossibly young.It’s painful to see written over Sherlock’s face, telegraphing from his body language.John aches to reach out and comfort, but he reminds himself what it is he is inexplicably dealing with.

“Leave him out of it.”

“The way your Dad hurt you, that’s how you’ll hurt him if you lay a hand on me, and it’s the way you’re hurting me right now, locking him up wherever it is he is, the way you’ve done.Let him go.”

“Why should I?Just because you’ve decided to add emotional manipulation to your arsenal.It’s not as though you care.It’s not as though he means a thing to you.”

John clenches his jaw.“You don’t know the first thing about it, and besides, it’s none of your business.”

“If you think that what I felt for Teddy was anything like what you feel for him, then you don’t have the first idea what it is to love another human being.”

John has pushed him back and pinned him to the wall before he even registers moving.“You’re in his head, not mine, now SHUT UP!”

The eyes above him widen, and his hands lift to John’s waist.“You’ve just surprised him.”

John blinks.

“You’ve rather shown your hand, Dr. Watson.”

John jolts backwards at the familiar words.Seven years prior in a swimming pool in the middle of the night.And suddenly he wonders—is this all some joke of Sherlock’s, some sick, fucking joke?!Or is this all for real, and is this all a part of it, little parts of Sherlock all wrapped up with little bits of this thing, whatever it is, the two of them meshing and melding together, already becoming one?It seems horribly intimate, and John has to fight off a sudden wave of jealousy.

“Sherlock, I swear to god, if you are just having me on again, to make me say things, I’ll…”

“He’s not.”Sherlock’s eyes are looking him over like he’s a bug under a microscope, like he’s trying to determine just what sort of man he is.“But I’m curious—just what sort of things?”

“That’s for me to tell _him_ , not _you_.”

“But you won’t, will you.”

John is done.“Out of him.NOW!”

The thing inside Sherlock sighs, and rolls its eyes.“So demanding.Fine.I’ll go.But you’d best take your opportunities while you have them Captain, because they are gone before you know it.”John sees a panic come to the pale grey eyes looming over him.Sherlock’s hands lift to cover his chest, and he rubs frantically, before gasping.“Before you know it!”He snaps.

He goes pale, and tears spring up in his eyes as the air around them goes cold all over again. 

“ _John…_ ”It’s barely a whisper, and he starts to slide down the wall.

“Christ.”John snatches Sherlock’s icy hand in his and starts pulling him away from the darkness, away from the cold, toward the far side of the gallery and the servants’ passage down to the kitchens.

Sherlock ( _if it is Sherlock; please Jesus, Joseph and Mary let it be Sherlock!_ ) _,_ follows in his wake, without argument, without resistance of any kind, and when they finally burst out of the dark stairwell, through the tiny door and into the warm, homely glow of the kitchens, John spins around and grabs Sherlock by both arms, searching his eyes frantically.

“Tell me it’s you.”

“What?”There are tears streaming down Sherlock’s cheeks, and John isn’t even sure if he’s aware of it.

“Is it you?!”He snaps.

“John, I don’t…”He reaches up and wipes at his cheeks, and then frowns down at the dampness on his fingertips.When he looks back up his eyes are horrified.“I want to go home.”

“Yeah.Okay.We’ll go home.Let’s go right now.”

John has never driven so fast in his life.Sherlock is shaking in the seat beside him, now, like he’s spent all night out in the damp and cold, and is chilled to the bone.John tries to think about the things his superstitious nanna used to tell him, bread for grounding, a bath with salts, firm, steady human touch from someone you trust, someone who’s solid and true.

John casts a sidelong glance in Sherlock’s direction.He’s staring straight ahead into the darkness, seemingly hypnotised by the glowing stripes on the road, disappearing beneath their wheels, and John pushes down the surge of adrenaline that races through his veins at the memory of everything that has just transpired.Like something out of a B-Grade horror film.Ridiculous.Incomprehensible.And if not for the fact that Sherlock looks very much like a man in shock, he would think it really was all some sick joke.

John is relieved beyond measure, when they leave the country roads behind for the brightly lit motorway on the outskirts of London, and more relieved still when they finally get into the city proper, to familiar streets, and finally park the car in the car park a street over fromBaker Street.

There is no way John is going home tonight.He’s staying.He’ll call the minder, and pay the overtime.Sherlock just sits and stares out the window, even though they’ve stopped, even though they’re parked and John has shut off the engine.it’s starting to get unsettling, and he hopes to heaven that he hasn’t inadvertently brought William Edwards home with him.

“Hey.”

Sherlock blinks, and then turns to look at him.

John forces a smile.“We’re back.Thought I’d walk back to the flat with you, make sure you get in okay.”

Sherlock swallows, and then suddenly lunges for the car door, nearly hitting the car beside them as he spills out and vomits all over the carpark floor.

“Jesus.”John hurries out, locks the car door behind him, and walks around to the passenger side only to find Sherlock leaning back against the car, face in his hands.“You going to be okay to walk back to to the flat?”

Sherlock is shivering again, and John walks over and leans against the car beside him, reaches out to lay a hand on his back, and is surprised when he responds by sliding over and resting his head on John’s shoulder.

“You okay?”

Sherlock shakes his head.

“Well, let's get back to the flat.You’ll feel better after you eat.”

Sherlock walks close enough to be touching the whole way back, and he is remarkably obedient and docile, eating the toast John makes him, drinking the chamomile tea, and even slipping into the warm bath John runs him, as long as John promises not to go too far.John sits on the floor outside the loo and listens to Sherlock washing in the next room.

“Well, I don’t know if you want my two cents, but I vote we never go back there again.”

“Fine.”

“Can probably find everything we need in the police reports, yeah?”

“Yes.”

“You okay?”

There is a long pause, in which the only sound is the water dripping from the faucet into the tub.The water stirs, and there is the squeak of Sherlock shifting in the tub.“John?”

“Yeah?”

“What happened?”

“How much do you remember?”

There is another stretch of silence, and then…“Very little.I remember addressing the…I remember going out into the room, ordering, and then it was cold, and I—I couldn’t get out.”

“Out?”

“Of my head.”

“Yeah, you—you went elsewhere for awhile.”

There is the sloshing of water, and then the door pops open, sending John sprawling onto the cold tile.He looks up at Sherlock, who is naked and dripping, except for a small towel he’s hastily wrapped around his waist.“Clearly you need to get back to Rosie, but I…”

“I called the minder.”John pushes himself up, and struggles to his feet.“She’ll stay the night.I’m here if you…”

Sherlock nods.“Good.”

“I think it gets better.”

A wrinkle of confusion forms between Sherlock brows.

“I just mean, I think what you’re feeling will pass.Takes a couple of days to wear off fully, but you’ll feel less drained, less emotional by morning.”

“How do you know?”It’s petulant and hopeful all at once.

John shrugs.“My nanna was a bit superstitious.Okay, a lot superstitious.I used to eavesdrop when she was talking to the neighbour ladies.Her prescription: eat bread, bath with salt, sleep with someone you trust, and you’ll feel better.So…”

“You’ll sleep with me?”

John sucks on his bottom lip, and shrugs.“Yeah.If you want.”

Sherlock nods and examines the tile at his feet for a moment, before looking up.“Please.”

“Yeah.Sure.Anytime.Anytime you need me, want me, I’m here.”

“I always needand want you here, John.”

“Yeah?”

Sherlock nods again.“Yes.”He holds John’s gaze until John can feel his cheeks starting to heat.

“Let’s go to bed then.”


	12. Sheltered

Sherlock is standing at the kitchen counter, stirring sugar into tea.

It’s raining outside, the sort of all day drizzle that alternates back and forth between fog and fine sleet, and makes everything dismal and grey.But the light is on over the cooker, and there is a small point of light glowing from Sherlock’s microscope on the table, and there is Sherlock, of course, the strongest source of warmth in the middle of their cluttered womb of a flat, the one that melts the tension of the day from John’s shoulders, and drains the noise in his head, and somehow soothes the aches in his bones without a single touch.

Just Sherlock.Just standing there making a cup of tea in his pyjamas and dressing gown, like he’s just got up, and it’s not a late and dismal afternoon/almost evening in early February.

John sets the bag of groceries he’s carrying down on the floor beside the fridge with a sigh.“Cold out there.”

“Mmm.It looks it.Did you get milk?I need it for a culture.”

“‘Course.”

“You’re a marvel.”

John smiles as he puts the food away.“You thought about supper?”

“I have not.”

“Chinese takeaway sound good?I’m too tired to cook.”

“Yes.Fine.”Sherlock’s sat back down at the table now, adjusting his microscope.He’s focussed, and only half-engaged.It gives John the opportunity to look, just to look at soft, freshly washed curls, no product, lying in soft waves about his neck, over his ears and forehead; at large, elegant hands, carefully adjusting the microscopes focus, and full lips wrapping absently around the rim of his teacup, and the long, pale column of his neck, which he stretches a little to the left and right, no doubt working out the tension left from a day of sitting hunched over his experiments.

John is in love.

He’s known this for years.He’s tried to ignore it, run from it, denied it, privately indulged it.But he’s never voiced it.Too risky, and a sentiment that would likely be scoffed at and unreturned, and yet…

Things have been different this last year, since he came back to Baker Street, since he came home.Sherlock is different.In the beginning he was more careful.And John had thought, _yes you should be, I’m dangerous, I’m a danger to you, I shouldn’t even have agreed to come back here._ But then there had been Sherlock’s unexpected bout of flu in the Spring, and John taking a week off work to nurse him back to health, and something had softened and shifted between them.

In June there had been the suggestion from Ella, that perhaps Sherlock join John for a session or two, and Sherlock had agreed to, and they had gone together.It had shocked John to learn that Sherlock had been there before, because of him, and it had shocked him more that Sherlock had been willing to keep going—together.It had been strange, and a little terrifying at first.But it had also been good.John isn’t sure he’s gotten any better at talking about things, but he knows he can, now.Sherlock will listen, will try at least, and sometimes John even feels heard.And sometimes John thinks he hears Sherlock, too.It’s something.

But today, here, in this moment, John loves Sherlock so much it sits like a heavy ache in his chest.It warms him and weighs him down all at once.There is comfort in what they have now, but there is regret there, too, regret over what they will never be.

John loves what they have.It’s enough.But still…

“What are you thinking about?”The words snap John’s attention back to the table, where Sherlock has leaned back in his chair, and is looking at him in a way that makes his breath catch, and heart race, that brings a flush of panic and embarassment to his cheeks. 

_What the fuck are you looking at?!_

He pushes it down.

“Nothing.”

“Something, I think.”

“Just—looking.”

“At me.Why?”

John could lie.Should lie.But…

He shrugs.“You look good.Sight for sore eyes.It’s been a day.I missed you.It’s good to be home, that’s all.”

Sherlock stares, his eyes taking in a million tiny tells, and John lets him, he lets him look even though it’s terrifying as well as exciting to be the centre of all that focus.

“You missed me?”And Sherlock sounds sincerely surprised by this piece of information.

“Yeah.‘Course I did.”John turns away, goes back onto the landing to hang up his coat.He started it, but now he’s terrified.A little space is just what he needs.“You want the fried or steamed rice with supper?”He calls over his shoulder.

There’s no response from the kitchen.Sherlock appears in the doorway.“I missed you, too.Do miss you, always, when you’re gone.For the record.”

John’s trapped.He’s standing in the landing, with nothing to busy him, phone on the table in the kitchen, coat hung up, just—standing alone in the dim space with the patter of the rain and soft hum of traffic outside, and the muffled natter of Mrs. Hudson’s television downstairs.

“Did you miss me when you were gone?”The words come out of nowhere.John had not been intending to say them, and he hates how he sounds now, vulnerable, and afraid, and desperately eager.

Sherlock steps into the landing, walks over to look down at him.“Every breath of every moment.”

“Did you miss me when _I_ was gone?”He’s just being greedy now, and it’s almost cruel to bring up everything that happened after Sherlock’s return, but he wants to hear it, and he needs Sherlock to know that it was something John had chosen to do, take himself away and out of Sherlock’s life.He had been punishing him, and the longer it had gone on, the more he had felt as though he was punishing himself as well.Mary had made that easier, but she’d also made it harder for him to forgive himself afterwards.Maybe he doesn’t really want to, he thinks.

“Yes.”Sherlock is so close now that John can breath his breath, and he wonders what will happen, why he wants to run, but doesn’t.Why his heart is racing, and the corners of his eyes pricking, and his body swaying, almost imperceptibly into Sherlock’s orbit, closer, and closer until he can feel the heat of him, the living, breathing reality of him, and he feels something inside him break.

Tears spill over before he can stop them, and it’s fucking inexcusable, embarrassing as hell to be like this, in the face of this.It’s his own fault, all of it, everything his fault—always, and what right has he to cry about any of it.

_Buck up Fuck-up._

John sucks in a sharp breath through his nose, the neurological memory of chronic ear boxing making his temples ache and his head swim.He wills himself to do just that, to be a man, but Sherlock doesn’t seem to notice, or care. _When has he ever really cared about things like that?_  

He steps right into John’s space, all the way in, and slides a hand around the back of John’s neck.A familiar gesture.They’ve been here before.And Sherlock’s like that.Likes to mirror and mimic.Safety in familiarity, but no less meaningful or sincere.John has learned that much this year, at least.

“It’s empty with you gone, John.This flat.My life…”The warm, steady weight of Sherlock’s hand draws John in, closer.“Me.I’m empty with you gone.”

And John wants to tell him to go.To get out while the getting is good, to avoid tying himself down to a Watson, because no good can come of it, and he’s always going to be broken, and he’s always going to be a mess, and he’s always going to let him down.He’ll hold grudges.He’ll be passive-aggressive.He’ll pull away and then punish Sherlock for it, like it’s his fault, like John isn’t really the one doing such a piss poor imitation of being human.

But Sherlock is pulling him closer, and his hands, his fucking beautiful hands are cradling John’s head like he’s something precious, and fragile, something that needs ( _deserves_ ) nurture and care, and John just—cries.Because there is so much, and all of it too large, and nowhere for it to go.And so he cries.

Sherlock takes him to bed.

He undresses him, slowly, tenderly, with infinite care.

He tucks him beneath the covers, and climbs in the other side, fully clothed and draws John close.He enfolds him.Over.Around.He shelters him.He lets John sleep.Safe.For maybe the first fucking time in his life—safe.


	13. Happy Valentine's Day

“What’s this then?”

John looks down at the small box Sherlock has just laid on the arm of his chair, and then up to meet the eyes that refuse to meet his.

“A gift.”Sherlock turns and walks back into the kitchen.

_A gift?_

It’s not his birthday, it’s not any sort of anniversary, John’s not done anything particularly brilliant of late, and besides, Sherlock doesn’t go in for all that sort of thing anyway.

A gift.

John picks up the small box, and turns it about in his hands.Not too heavy, not too light.Small and rectangular.Wrapped in a fine paper that looks like something you’d see on the walls in an old Edwardian cottage.He shakes it.By the soft sound determines that it contains two, if not three small objects.

“Stop trying to deduce and open it.”From the kitchen.

John rolls his eyes and grins.“Pot, kettle, black.”

“Mmm.”

John opens it.a small cardboard box with a gold seal, and inside two chocolate truffles nestled in berry-coloured tissue paper, and a tiny envelope.

John stares down at them.

Valentine’s Day.It’s Valentines Day, and—Sherlock Holmes has just given him a box of chocolates.

“This better not be drugged.”

Sherlock makes a small sound of indignation from the kitchen.

“Wouldn’t be the first time, and you know it.”

“I don’t do that anymore, _you_ know _that_.We—talked about it.I’ve stuck to my word.”

John takes one out, bites into it.It’s chocolate orange, his favourite, and he hums with pleasure.“Christ these are good.You want the other one?”

“No.They’re for you.Did you open the card?” 

John stares back down at the tiny envelope lying on his thigh.It contains something heavy.

He tears it open and dumps the item onto his palm.A key.

He picks it up.“You sending me on some sort of scavenger hunt?”

“No.”

“What’s this for then?”

Sherlock sighs.“Check your phone.”

John fishes it out of his pocket.He has a text from Sherlock.A link.He clicks and blinks down at the estate agent’s listing that appears.It’s quaint, homely, somewhere rural with a nice garden.Old enough that he assumes its probably Grade 2 listed.

“We got a case?”

“No.We have a house.”

“We?”

Everything is silent in the kitchen.John cranes his neck around to peek over the back of his chair.Sherlock is staring down at the experiment before him on the table.Just staring.He takes a deep breath, holds it.“We aren’t getting any younger, we take less cases.Rose is gone away to school now, Mrs. Hudson is…”He swallows.“I thought perhaps you might consider…”

And suddenly John understands.Sherlock has bought this house.He’s bought it for—them.

“You want to retire?”

“Before I—embarrass myself.Yes.”

“Hey.”John gets to his feet, and goes to stand beside Sherlock, who presses his shoulder almost imperceptibly against John’s thighs the minute he draws close.John lays a hand atop his head, rubs his fingers into curls threaded through with silver and shorn closer than they had been when they were both younger.“We all make mistakes.That last case was…”

“I’m getting too old for it, John.You’re getting too old.”

“Oi.”It’s gentle and half-hearted.He’s right.John’s known it for awhile, but not wanted to say, because, truthfully, he had no idea what would happen next.On the surface, at least, it’s the work that has kept them together all these years.They’re partners.It’s what they do.Without it…Well, John wasn’t sure he’d still be needed—wanted.

Sherlock looks up a him.Face a mirror of worry.“Would you consider it?”

John smiles crookedly.“What?Retire to the country with you, like two doddering old gentlemen?”

Sherlock’s eyes drop.“I told Sally after the last one, that I wouldn’t be doing any more cases for the Met.”

John feels all the oxygen go out of the room.“You never told me that.”

“I…”John sees a muscle in Sherlock’s jaw jump.He swallows tightly and draws in a shaking breath.“I worried you might…It’s what we do.It’s who we’ve always been, I thought…”

“You thought I would go?”

Sherlock swallows again.“Will you?”It’s barely a whisper.He stares down at his hands.He won’t look up.

John’s chest aches.He aches for the fact that they have shared a flat for almost two decades, and yet in all that time he’s never managed to say the things that matter.After all this time, Sherlock still doesn’t know.He wants John—wants to spend the rest of his life with John, and yet he still doesn’t know that that is exactly what John has wanted almost from the start. 

“You didn’t have to buy us a Grade 2 listed cottage to get me to stay.”

Sherlock’s head pops up.There are tears in his eyes, and John feels gutted.

“I’m an idiot.”

Sherlock looks confused at the confession.

“I’m an idiot.”John repeats, reaches a hand out, pulls Sherlock to his feet when he takes it.“Come here.”

Sherlock walks into his arms.They do this.They do this at least.It’s familiar.And when John’s arms are around his waist, he looks up at Sherlock’s red-rimmed, and slightly confused eyes, and smiles.“Of course I’ll stay.Of course I’ll follow you anywhere you want to go.It was never just about the work.”

Sherlock’s bottom lip wobbles, and John pulls him closer.“You’re my best friend, and—I’ve loved you for years.”

The tears spill over.

“Don’t know what I’d do, or where I’d go if you ever wanted me to leave.So yeah, let’s go be eccentric, grumpy old retirees together, then.Let’s—do all the things we’ve been too stupid to do up until now—before it’s too late.”And to illustrate his point, John presses up onto his tiptoes, presses his forehead to Sherlock’s, and when he doesn’t pull away, presses one inch closer still—and kisses him.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Enough is Enough](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14687871) by [sussexbound (SamanthaLenore)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SamanthaLenore/pseuds/sussexbound)




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